


Here We Go Again

by MaverickWerewolf



Series: OCtober 2019 [1]
Category: Original Work, Wulfgard
Genre: Dungeons & Dragons, F/M, Gen, Modern AU, October, Original Character(s), prompt fills
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-10-06
Updated: 2019-10-15
Packaged: 2020-11-25 23:36:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 3,240
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20920511
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MaverickWerewolf/pseuds/MaverickWerewolf
Summary: Various prompt fills for OCtober, a challenge on r/fanfic. Lots of antics, maybe some drama, and plenty of Tom and Caiden.





	1. Dungeons & Dragons - Tom

Rain. Rain, rain, and more rain, and he didn’t mean that rainy day smell Caiden always carried with him. This rain lashed in sheets against the windows, beating on the roof, and—

Yeah, the power went out. With it came the sudden silence of _oh shit there__’s no electricity_. No fridge, no fans, no moving air, no TV – all the electronic hums were dead.

And that was why he and some of the others were sitting around the dinner table now surrounded by papers and books all about Dungeons & Dragons. Which was a pretty hilarious substitute to living something kind-of-sort-of like that, but what can you do, right?

_He_ being _Tom_, of course. Tom Drake, at your service. And to his left was Surandil, the pale blue-haired elf wizard with amazing fashion sense and still wearing robes even in a world that clearly left those behind a long time ago. To his right was Kye, demon – arguably half demon, but that was actually super complicated – cinnamon roll and one of the sweetest guys in all the various worlds flying around in whatever nebulous space you believed in.

Oh, and at the head of the table? Sadja, wood elf, the one who’d dug Surandil’s books out of his bag because she was just that nosy and Tom adored her for it and lots of other things.

Anyway, now they were making characters, and it was Tom’s turn. He stared at the empty, extensive character sheet under his nose and started chewing on his pencil. Trouble was, Sadja was off trying to find something to snack on, so Tom figured he’d just pose his question to the room—

He took the pencil out of his mouth and blurted, “Can I be a dragon?”

Everyone paused. From his place on the couch, Caiden snorted quietly. Hey, he’d almost forgotten Caiden: always eating up all the space in a room in every single sense of that phrase. Literally every single one. Don’t think about it too hard. It just made sense.

Surandil cut his eyes to Tom and said simply, “No.”

“What? C’mon, it’s called Dungeons and _Dragons_.”

“You fight the dragons. You do not play as them.”

“Why not?”

“Dragons are incredibly powerful, and…”

“Hey, look, it’s Sadja’s game, right? Can’t she make the rules?”

“Certainly, yes, but if we hope to allow this session to last the power outage, we should not allow _playable dragons _into the campaign. You may, however, play as a dragon_born_.”

Tom furrowed his brow. “What’s the difference?”

“You are essentially a dragon-man. It is an area in which you may be familiar.”

“Oh, _ha ha_, that’s…” beside him, Kye grimaced and hid behind his character sheet, holding it up in front of his face. Tom put on a bit of a grin and patted Kye on the back— no, shoulder, since his wings were always in the way for any back-patting. “Kye, please, I’m not gonna eat him.”

Sadja, meanwhile, reappeared with a sucker stuck in her mouth. Tom glanced up just in time to see her tilt he head back at Caiden behind her and slowly pull the sucker out with a loud _pop_. Then lick it.

Caiden stared and something in his neck twitched. Tom’s jaw went a little slack.

“Uuhhh…”

“Drake. You were saying?”

“Dragonborn— dragonborn, sure. I’ll be a dragon-dude. A red one. A paladin.”

“Paladins have to be lawful good,” Kye said quietly, tail batting now and then against one leg of Tom’s chair.

“Pff, I can be lawful good…”

“Your paladin will most likely fall,” said Surandil.

“Guys, c’mon, have a little faith. You’re just jealous ‘cause I’m gonna look _awesome_. I’m gonna have horns and scales and breathe _fire _and have _wings_ and…”

“Dragonborn do not have wings.”

_Well what the fuck._

Tom’s grin went blank. He turned to Surandil with a frown.

“Dragons have wings, buddy.”

“Dragon_born_, however, do not,” Surandil repeated calmly, in that usual _I am so right all the time, deal with it _tone, almost a monotone, and _ugh_.

“That is _so _lame, but fine, okay, sure, I get not wanting me to fly I guess, whatever.” Tom leaned back and folded his arms. “At least I got the tail.”

Nobody said anything. Tom blinked.

“They don’t have _tails?_”

“They do not.”

“What is the _fucking point then_?”

Sadja finally took a break from tormenting Caiden with the combination of hard candy and her mouth to say, “You can have a tail, Duckling.”

“_Thank _you.”

Tom scribbled some more info about Sir Draconis – what? It worked, okay? – down on his sheet, grinned, and leaned forward on his elbows.

“So where do we start?”


	2. Dungeons & Dragons - Caiden

It kept storming. Not much sign of stopping, either, not with the wind howling through every crack in the building, creaking boards and rattling windows.

In here, there were other storms. Caiden mostly managed to ignore them – he’d had plenty of time to get used to them by now. Before, though? Before, they tried to drive him insane. Especially two. The loudest two – within and without.

From his station taking up the entire length of the couch and then some, with a bright LED lamp on the table near his head, Caiden felt it all. Heard it all, too, though he had little doubt he would’ve still experienced both even if he’d been upstairs, given the emotion levels – and the volume levels.

That, and the cabin was pretty small to begin with.

“So why couldn’t _I _be the dragon, if there is a dragon?” Tom cut in, leaning forward on his elbows like Caiden had seen him do through most of the game.

The intense heat coming off him seemed a little too much to just be playing something for fun, but that wasn’t exactly anything new. Tom always seemed ready to burn the world down.

Then again, Sadja said he felt the same way.

“Because you’re a dragon_born_, s’in the rules,” Sadja said, waving a book around. Then slamming it, hard and noisily, back onto the table with an, “Ow. Why they make these things so thick?”

“The rules are quite extensive,” Surandil put in from where he sat sipping his tea, “as I’m sure you are learning.”

“Since when did _you _follow rules?” Tom said, squinting at Sadja.

And Caiden felt a fresh, hot wave of something like outrage. Sadja glared at him briefly, then made a slight face.

“_Anyway_,” Sadja said, putting her theatrical voice back on as she settled in to hide half her face behind the GM screen until only her eyes peered over. And her very long, pointed ears. “You lot come to a bend in the dank dark caverns…”

Caiden lifted his book up in front of his face again and, with his free hand, dug around in the crate of snacks he’d brought from the kitchen. They still had plenty, thanks to Sadja being in charge of the food stores.

She was getting worked up about something. He felt it, an excitement almost vibrating deep in his inside. Hers, not his, but strong enough that it started edging his own feelings out and trying to take their place.

Long story how all that worked.

He ripped open what turned out to be a bag of jerky and started eating it. Just in time for—

“… a dragon! A great big dragon all clad in shiny green scales atop his piles of gold, and he’s…”

Her eyes lit on him. Sadja’s. He could feel it.

“He’s – eating snacks. But he looks real mad. And he…”

Caiden paused when he realized Sadja’s weren’t the only eyes on him. Everyone else stared now, too. He looked their way and saw the entire table of Dungeons and Dragons players staring hard at him, Tom maybe hardest of all.

Sadja, meanwhile, gestured for him to _go _like he was in a play.

He huffed. “The dragon says why there puny adventurers bothering him when he’s _eating_.”

Confusion. Worry. It seemed to come from all of them, all except Sadja, who put on a devilish grin as she sank back down behind that GM screen. Her amusement tickled at his ribs, and he stuck another piece of jerky in his mouth to help fight a smile.

“Uh— _uh_,” Kye sputtered, suddenly shuffling several papers in front of him, the claws on his left hand puncturing a few and making him yelp.

Surandil calmly began to study a paper of his own with a quiet, “Oh dear.”

And Tom sat up straighter without sparing his character sheet a single glance.

“I’m gonna intimidate him,” Tom said, snatching up a die.

“Youaren’tserious,” Kye blurted, staring at him.

Tom was too busy staring at Caiden. Caiden stared back. Sadja, meanwhile, glanced between the two like this was the intimidation check.

“I offer the dragon all— our party’s gold if he’ll let us pass,” Kye declared. He’d been voted the one in charge of party funds, since he never bought anything for himself.

Not until now, anyway. And Tom and Surandil hadn’t expected it, either.

“Kye, what the hell—” “I did not consent to such a decision.”

But Caiden cut in with, “Alright.”

They all froze.

“It’s a deal,” he said, jabbing his chin toward the coffee table in front of the sofa he’d claimed. “Empty your bags.”

Kye stood up, came over – almost tripped on his spearheaded tail that’d tried to get tangled in his legs from sitting so long – and dumped a pile of toy gold coins on Caiden’s coffee table. Caiden put the book down, swung his legs over the couch, sat up, and started counting coins.

“All your food, too,” he added.

Kye turned on his heel, came back, and dropped a few fruit snacks on the pile.

“Kye, buddy, for gods’ sakes, we’re not _that _freaking low level…” Tom started, but Surandil put a hand on his arm.

“He’ll live off summoned bread,” Surandil said. “It will be sufficient punishment.”

And Kye sat back down in his chair, tucking his wings in close. “I just saved us all from being eaten,” he said, folding his hands over his character sheet again and looking at Sadja.

Sadja, who still sat there giggling, ears perked up perfectly straight like daggers. She threw Caiden a look, and Caiden met it. This time, he couldn’t hide that smile that pulled at the corner of his lips.

She kept doing it, too. Roping him in to play NPCs. The dragon even showed up again, made Tom even more jealous. Every time, Caiden played along.

That was how they weathered the storm.


	3. Childhood Memories - The Sea's Bounty

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Prompt fill doubling for both a Patreon reward and for OCtober. Prompt was childhood memories - specifically, in the case of the Patreon one, something from Tom's childhood when he was an orphan on the streets of Illikon, his home city.

Illikon sure was beautiful. Not that that was new – not new at all. Illikon was _always _beautiful.

But it was even more beautiful when Tom had seen it from the deck of that ship he was absolutely not supposed to be on. Nobody would let a little kid onto a ship, especially not one as seedy and questionable as this one. Sure, Illikon got lots of pretty ships and plenty of upstanding merchants – not to mention super interesting foreigners from Northrim, from the South, from all kinds of places – but he’d gone and picked _this _ship.

Why?

Because he was going to steal from them, of course.

What? He was just a kid. Yes, he was a kid. How old was he? Who knew? He didn’t. Didn’t really care, either. All he knew was he wasn’t even old enough to be considered ready to hold a sword in the militia. Now, if he was a noble, he’d be a page right now or something, carrying the swords and shields of knights and starting down the path to becoming one himself— but hey. He wasn’t. He was just – here. Fending for himself, totally alone.

Anyway, the ship: it was a beauty, with a tall mast and a lower deck loaded with oars, not meant for sailing far out to sea. This thing probably traded goods up and down the Empire, maybe even went as far south as Kemhet. It was a pretty ship, but it was also pretty easy to steal from.

Yeah, so he’d been here for a while. Stowed away while they were in port, swiping food when he could and stockpiling it in a big old sackcloth bag he’d fashioned for himself. It was sturdy and pretty sizable, and he could tie it over his chest and still have his arms free to climb around. It _was _clever, thank you. Of course it was; he’d made it.

This was getting super boring now, though, sneaking around on the ship under the noses of the various sailors. He’d gotten a pretty good stockpile of things: jerky, bread, some fruit – lemons; what was it with sailors and lemons? – pickles, some rum…

Finally he heard a voice shout from the upper deck, “Make ready to sail!”

That was his cue. Only time to get off a ship when you weren’t supposed to be there was right before they left. That way, they wouldn’t turn around and haul butt right back to port when they realized some street orphan had gone and stolen some of their stock. Which was really that _much_, come on, it wasn’t like they’d die of starvation before reaching another port or anything.

Now heavy boots thudded to and fro over the deck above him, wood creaking. From where he half lay against the wall in his far little corner he’d found for himself, behind some crates full of food he’d helped himself to, Tom sat up and threw that sack over his chest. He tied it tight, double checked it – because he could be careful _sometimes_, when it really mattered – and slipped out from between the boxes to slink over toward the hatch leading up, feeling very ready to leave behind all the overwhelming scents wafting up from the bilge.

Now came the hard part: getting off the ship before they actually left port. Well, ‘hard.’ There were lots of definitions of hard. Other people would consider it hard, maybe. This was Tom’s favorite part. And yes, he’d done this before.

Almost the instant he laid a hand on the ladder leading up toward the hatch, though, that hatch flew open, and Tom looked right up into the angry stare of a grizzled sailor guy with a scar over his face and a beard grown so thick Tom wondered if one of the rats from the bilge took vacations in there.

Tom blinked. “Whoops.”

“The bloody hell are you!?” the sailor roared, sticking one long arm down the hatch to reach for him, but Tom was already gone. He ducked and darted away, off into the shadows below deck – just long enough for that sailor to come clambering down and start shouting all kinds of things like ‘come out, boy’ and ‘I’ll hang you from the mast’ and stuff.

Tom ran right past him when he wasn’t looking. It wasn’t hard at all, really – he was just too fast for anybody. He always had been. Well, usually. Most of the time. Anyway, it worked _this_ time, and that was all that mattered right now.

Scrambling up the ladder, Tom emerged out into the bright sun and brisk sea breeze that he absolutely adored, all Illikon and all fantastic. But sailors covered the deck, handling rigging and carrying cargo around, and Tom didn’t belong there.

So just as the shouts started carrying up from the hold and everyone on deck realized there was some dumb thief kid standing there like a blithering moron, Tom moved.

He turned, ran right for the mast, and grabbed a rope – no, he didn’t know their names or what they did; it wasn’t like he could read or had books or anything – and used it to swing out of reach of yet another angry sailor probably looking to wring his neck.

They were all up in arms now, bellowing in some language Tom didn’t understand. Sounded real mad, though. That made him grin.

So he kicked off from the nearest railing he swung to, jumped up to another rope that hung low enough to grab – and something came loose that wasn’t supposed to, got everybody shouting even more as the rigging went lopsided and sent Tom lopsided with it.

But he went lopsided right toward the edge of the ship – toward the docks the sailors were trying to leave behind.

Tom’s landing couldn’t exactly be called _graceful, _but he liked to think it reasonably passed as that, even when he landed eating a face full of wooden pier and went tumbling head over heels. That didn’t make the sailors on the ship any happier, as they were all still kicking up a fuss and gathering on the sides of the ship to glare at him and spit what he figured were curses and swears, making various threatening gestures. A few of them had even drawn knives, like they’d planned to gut him. Hilarious.

Tom righted himself, put on a stupid grin, and fired a two-fingered salute off his forehead, watching as the ship pulled out. Because the rowers hadn’t really cared that some kid had taken some food – they never did care. Whoever captained that ship had a lot more to worry about, and Tom always counted on that.

With his victory all spent, though, he had one last thing to do. Wiping some blood off his nose, because _ow_, that landing had actually been kind of terrible and he could’ve broken his neck, Tom checked that sack and started walking.

The food looked okay. Some of it was a little banged up, sure, but it was still good to eat – and definitely better than nothing. They’d had some good stuff, too. Tom took a few pieces of jerky and stuck one in his mouth as he made his way back off the docks.

Behind him, one of Illikon’s eternally beautiful sunsets painted itself across the horizon. Purple and orange banded with gold, all set against the shimmering ocean. Tom turned and stared at it as he walked, taking a deep breath of the salty sea air, listening to the waves roll against the shore, sloshing against the wooden docks and underbellies of the great ships resting for the night.

Home. This was _home._ And he wouldn’t trade it for the entire world.

One last thing to do: round the next corner, climb through the broken window of a little hovel, and take that sack of food from around his shoulders. She was asleep, which was fine. That meant he could leave the food and scoot.

From the bed to one corner of the one room in the tiny house, an eye peeked open just enough to look at him – an eye set in the aging face of a sailor who couldn’t sail those incredible seas anymore, and Tom felt terrible about that.

She couldn’t much walk, either, and Tom felt terrible about that, too. He’d seen her around a few times. Talked to her now and then – her name was Matilda. She always told him stories of her time on the ocean.

So when she saw him leaving that sack of food for her, he put on a smile and gave a quick wink, then turned and slipped right back out through the window. No need to have her get up, after all. It was almost night.

And the night was his favorite.


End file.
